We all know that the airline industry is struggling with higher fuel prices and extra security measures as a result of 9/11 etc. While it cannot be easy for airlines to do all things well, some certainly do things better than others and the paying public appreciate those that look after their customers well. Those that don't look after their customers soon will find themselves without customers as the public make their choices based on good service and value.
We take an annual vacation from Toronto, Canada to Savannah, Georgia and usually fly with some of the major US carriers, rather than Air Canada. We have flown with Delta, US Airways, American and others but the worst customer service and communication has been from US Airways. Last year we booked our flights online directly through the US Airways website and received confirmation of the booking. The day before our flights were due to leave I started checking the flight status on the US Airways website. Each time I would type in our flight number, it would return an error which appeared to be a website error and no other information was being returned. This continued several times. I guess I should have been more concerned but just suspected they were having web issues and that it would eventually work. Finally, the morning we were leaving, I tried the website for the Pearson Airport in Toronto to check on the status of the flight. There was no record of our flight on that website. I started to feel a bit panicky and immediately phoned US Airways. It was about 7:00 am and we had been due to fly at 10:30 am. I was eventually told that our flight had been cancelled months earlier and we had been rescheduled onto the 6:30 am flight from Toronto. When I pointed out to the woman that it was already after 7:00 am she didn't seem the least bit concerned. Then told me that she couldn't get us on any other flights out that day. You can imagine that I was not pleased with this news. After speaking to a supervisor our flights were rebooked for a departure at 12:30 from Toronto. Unfortunately, we were going to have a 5 hour layover in Philadelphia before we could go on to Savannah.
I pressed for information on why we had not been informed of the flight change as we had provided both and e-mail address and phone numbers at the time of the booking. The agent told me that when I book online I am acting as my own travel agent and it is up to me to check frequently to find out if anything has been changed on our itinerary. After assuring her that this was ridiculous, I gave up on the call. We finally arrived at our final destination after 10 hours of travelling and layover time and we were exhausted and missed our check in time for the resort etc and had trouble finding anyone to check us in - it had not been a good day.
When we returned home, I wrote a complaint letter to US Airways advising them of the situation and my disappointment with the lack of communication and then the transfer of blame to me for not having checked my itinerary.
They sent us vouchers for travel and an apology letter. I was pleased with their response but wary of trusting them again.
When it came time to book our vacation this year, we planned to use the vouchers. I once again signed onto the US Airways website to book our flights. At the final stage where I wanted to input the voucher information, I found that there was nowhere to do so. I called their customer service line and was told that I would have to go to the airport to pay for my flights there with the vouchers and that they could only hold the flight booking for 24 hours so I would have to go to the airport within that timeframe or risk losing the price we had been quoted online. This seemed like rubbing salt in the wound of the previous encounter. It should be easier to use the vouchers online.
At the airport I was lucky enough to encounter a wonderful ticket agent and she was able to sort the issue and apply the vouchers to the tickets and even found us a lower fare than had originally been shown on the website. I was pleased with the end result.
So, vacation time is here again and I signed onto the US Airways site last night to verify our itinerary and guess what - our flights had been changed AGAIN and we had not been contacted, in spite of the fact that we had once again provided phone numbers and e-mail addresses. I was asked to click a button to accept the changes and then was presented with an error page stating that changes could not be made to our itinerary online and that I must contact their helpline.
You can imagine that I was not feeling confident based on past experience. However, I was lucky enough to contact a knowledgeable agent who was able to confirm our itinerary and make new seat arrangements etc for us. She also took our phone numbers again and promised that we would be contacted in the event of any further changes.
I guess I'll have to let you know how it goes when we get back from vacation. This will be the last chance we give US Airways to prove to us that we are valued customers. There are still many other airlines available to choose from in spite of downsizing and mergers in the industry. The consumer must be able to make wise choices in the marketplace and I hope this article will help you make the right choices for your air carrier and also learn that you must be vigilant in following up on your travel details as it appears you are not able to rely upon the airlines to advise you, even though they claim they care about their customers.